Autobiographies of interesting characters
by capt. h
Summary: Character descriptions, as told by the characters themselves. Currently drafted: Flandre, Mokou, Keine, Remilia, Reiuji Utsuho, Medicine Melancholy, Yukari Yakumo, Yuuka Kazami, Rin Kaenbyou
1. Flandre Scarlet

Hi! My name is Flandre Scarlet.

I was locked in the basement of the Mansion for 495 years. Well, locked isn't the right word, as I could leave at any time. Remi said that the outside was a scary place, and asked me to stay inside the mansion for my own safety. I don't know what she's so worried about though, since I can just Kyuu~ anything that tries to stop me.

I can kyuu anything. First, I look at the thing I want to kyuu. Then, I hold out my hand and grab the center of the thing I want to kyuu. Then, I close my hand into a fist around the center of the thing, and KYUU! No more thing. Fairies are really fun to kyuu, some of them explode into ice shards, while others go up like a big messy piñata, but full of red jelly instead of candy. I don't see why Remi doesn't like it when I kyuu fairies, they always grow back. Well, except the one who I kyuued when she was jelly – that one stayed kyuued.

I can Kyuu non-physical things too! I can kyuu spells, clouds which sometimes break and othertimes leak when I kyuu them, water which forms an awesome big wave when I kyuu it, fire that explodes when kyuued, and I can even kyuu air! Recently I got to kyuu history with Keine, but don't worry, it was only a small part of history involving radiation poisoning and Hell. I want to visit hell someday, it sounded like a fun place. I'm not sure what radiation is though. Patchy would know better than me.

I fibbed a bit though, I can't quite kyuu everything. Some things are just too big – the center of the moon can't fit in the palm of my hand, so I can't make it go Kyuu. I still need some practice, but maybe one day I'll be able to kyuu the sun so me and Remi can play outside! Then she'll never have to worry about burning in the sun again!

You may wonder what I did for nearly 500 years alone in the basement. And some of you may assume that I just sat, by myself, doing nothing for all that type. Nope! I spent most that time in the library, learning as many spells as Patchy could teach me. I'm really good at it too, I'm even better than Patchy! Though Patchy doesn't like playing spell duels with me much… Usually, she ends up reading me a story instead of playing. I really like the ones about this Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot, and the one where everyone dies was fun.

I seem to get stuck playing by myself a lot. Patchy just reads and reads and makes a couple spell cards before reading some more – she never plays anything with me. Koakuma, her assistant will sometimes play, but never with spells, and she isn't very good at strategy. No one here is – I have never lost a game of chess, and the one time I lost a spell duel I was playing two against one. At least Remi doesn't lose in under twenty turns, but I think she's manipulating her fate when she plays against me.

I like reading, I like games, and I like kyuuing faires, but I'm bored. Ever since Marisa started stealing books, I've been more and more interested in everything outside. Maybe Remi will take me with her for on next picnic? Or maybe I can Kyuu my way out of the house to join Remi on her next picnic? I think the latter would be much more fun.


	2. Fujiwara no Mokou

Fujiwara no Mokou

People die when you kill them. When you die, you stay dead. These absolute natural laws have no meaning to me, who can never die. My existence is absolute, removed from the cycle of life and death.

A long time ago, I drank an elixir of immortality. Now I can't die. But that wasn't enough. I would die, but I wouldn't stay dead, and I was pretty weak as well. And death is painful. But everywhere I went, people wanted to kill me until I stayed dead, out of fear of the unkillable apparition that appeared before them. I got tired of dying, and when I caught wind of a phoenix that could grant whoever it possessed with immense power and immortality provided they survive the possession, I was intrigued. I was already immortal, so I saw no reason not to double the layer of immortality.

Being possessed by a phoenix is the most painful experience I have ever had in 1300 years. It drove me completely insane, but I got better. And even after the possession, I still feel the pain of burning to death every time I use my flames. I simply do not care about the pain anymore.

This may seem strange to you, being able to not only ignore burning to death, but entering combat with the intention of giving myself unimaginable pain. That is because you have not yet experienced all the pain. The possession processes felt like having white hot nails hammered into you from the inside out. It also takes a month to complete, and you still feel the agony of burning to death every time you resurrect. It is not as bad as I make it sound though; after the experience, pain of every intensity stops being of notice. Much like an old man cannot function day to day if he notices every time his back aches, I could not function if I noticed the pain of being tortured to death every time I used phoenix fire.

I mentioned that this pain drove me insane. For a while, I would share my pain. Countless wanderers and youkai died at my hands during that century. If I had to burn, then the world should burn with me. After a century I got bored, stopped noticing the pain completely, and started travelling the world. A fortunate side effect of having the power to instantly burn all the oxygen in the air is that you stop needing to breath, which lead to a lot of interesting trips across the ocean. The pressure at the bottom was still a problem, which caused me to accidentally kill myself more than once. Once I crossed the ocean, I was able to explore the world. It's amazing how much an indistinct outfit and some black-hair dye does for anonymity. I was able to witness the majesty of untouched nature, the rise of nations, empires spanning the globe, revolutions in the arts and sciences that never caught on in Gensoko, world wars, the largest explosion in current history, and was fortunate to witness the day humans landed on the moon.

No human and few Youkai can last more than 50 years without uprooting their lifestyle in some way. Whenever you meet a resident that is more than 200 years old, they are guaranteed to have a very rich, hidden history of those centuries to share. Except Kaguya. I'm not sure if it's the lunarian blood or if she is simply lazier than Yukari, but Kaguya does absolutely nothing during the twenty+ year trips I took outside the border after our feud started. Perhaps she makes medicine with Eirin?

Me and Kaguya rarely duel. Kaguya is a great general backed by the Moon's best strategist, and I'm a great warrior who has been locked in and out of battle for over a thousand years, so we can't fight eachother one-on-one or in full-scale battles due to our radically different battle skills. Instead our fights involve Kaguya invading the forest of the lost or me sneaking into Eientei to assassinate Kaguya. If we ever do fight directly, Eirin will almost always back Kaguya up, and sometimes Keine will help me. This usually evens out the discrepancy in power.

Contrary to what I have said before, putting me in so much pain that I can no longer fight became impossible after the phoenix possession. Instead, I only lose when I no longer have the energy to get up. Provided that it is physically possible for me to raise my arm I can continue to battle, and I have often lost because my body could no longer support my attempt to continue after so many resurrections and so many exhausting spell cards. The moon princess, having only the combat experience she attained by fighting me, has nowhere near this tolerance for pain, and not nearly as much experience using her powers as I have using mine. For that reason, a straight duel is completely out of the question.

Kaguya tries to kill me on a daily basis, and I do detest her for it. I think she's curious about what happens when she kills me in dozens of creative or interesting ways, likes the sport, and I really do think killing me is her only source of entertainment. Not that I mind killing her, but it gets really irritating after the 203rd time. I don't want to kill and be killed on a daily basis. Every day I have to patch my clothes from the previous battle, collect enough food and drink enough water to prevent myself from accidentally starving to death (although it is a non-issue, being full is more fun than starving), and rest up from the previous battle that left me so exhausted my limbs ceased functioning. She gets even worse after I return from one of my many long trips, making me battle her for days after I had already lost the ability to move. More than once she got really creepy about it and carried me to her bedroom in Eientei for "fun". On those days I am very grateful that Kaguya has not found a way to seal my phoenix powers.


	3. Keine Kamishirasawa

History of Keine Kamishirasawa –

I have the power to change history. I mean that in the most literal sense of the word. In fact, I have been making myself semi-immortal by shifting my birthday up further and further for the last 560 years. I am currently 39, which is fairly young by half-beast standards.

The conditions to changing history are fairly simple to explain, but complex to fully appreciate. I can make any fact true by declaring it to have happened. The fact must be a historical event. The fact cannot be an emotion, feeling, or non-historical instance. The fact cannot be in the future or present of history. The fact cannot be a negation, as events that never happened are not history. A historical fact I write will remain true unless directly logically contradicted by another historical fact I write, so it is important to avoid apparent paradoxes, as the history will manipulate itself to match both facts instead of nullifying the first. And I must make the history a history by giving the fact to people who will then pass the fact down through the generations. The fact must be believed for it to become history. Otherwise, it remains as merely a memory. And the person who is given the fact will remember who authored the history, much like a reader will remember who authored a book.

To write a history, I need to write something that could fit into a history book, and then make sure it remains in the books. There's no better way to do that than as the village schoolteacher.

Mokou is very important to the history writing process – a history given to her will almost always become a history. Kaguya is as well, she's the backup. Because there are two immortals, I can write a semi-future history – a history that might take place in the past depending on a future event – which grants Mokou the ability to write history when I die. In the worst case, she can show the history to Kaguya who will then suffice to verify that I was born some time greater than a year after I died, which will return me to life. Maybe. I've attempted future histories before with mixed results, and I've had little success. And there's no promise that my histories would take effect after I die. I'll have to see the vampires about this; they seem to have some knowledge of fate, which might help me create my emergency history.

I can only use this power during the full moon, any other time and I can only conceal history, which can protect me until the next full moon when necessary. You may wonder why that is. It's because I choose to be that way. History control is way too powerful, and I want to be the hero. I want to protect the human village, watch over the children, educate them, and live in a colorful and deep world of magic without being feared or a villain or worst of all, with god level powers that break the story. So I rewrote my own history to weaken my power so that I can only use it on the full moon. This allowed me to retroactively rewrite Reimu's victory in incidents where she failed, granting her the god-level reputation of Gensokyo's untouchable savior, while giving me a sense of what life with risk and uncertainty is like. Reimu is a very powerful youkai hunter and rarely needs help, but Gensokyo needed someone unbeatable to strike fear into the hearts of youkai before they ever start an incident, so I do tend to improve the speed and talent with which she resolves incidents after the fact. Thus, I am an unrecorded line of defense against Gensoko's destruction, who has feigned the life of a normal schoolteacher for 78 years.

Well, not normal. More of a town hero and protector, without all the fear that having god-level powers creates. With a were-curse, an immortal best friend, eternal youth, and a headbutt that makes Suika reel. In retrospect, I'm incredibly bad at the normal part of life, but I do like being the town hero and being respected as an authority on all history. I admit that the were-curse is a bit overdone, and I wasn't the best author at the time. In fact, I still find myself lacking, sometimes causing incidents myself for the fun of it. Though I have to be careful, if I invoke my powers too much, I'll be the least interesting character in my story, and I wouldn't want that considering I only sacrificed my powers in the first place to make my life more interesting. I can always tone down the deux ex machina and write myself out of the history if it will make the world of fantasy a better place, a better narrative, or all around better. I am a secret line of defense, so if you want to assume I had no involvement in a story I'll gladly write myself out of it, there's enough self insertion in the world already. I didn't write myself into the history of the stories I corrected, I merely correct the history.

As a result of my power, I have a lot of fascinating stories about the past that were deleted by the new history. The world was destroyed many more times than anyone would want to believe, and a footnote changing the time of an event from 12:00pm to 12:30 has saved the world before, while giving the heroes enough time to stop the digital countdown at exactly the last minute. If you ever wondered why every digital countdown clock is always stopped within 10 seconds of zero, it is because I love heroes that always make it in the nick of time, and sometimes I fudge the history to make the legends and myths more fun. People have no trouble believing heroes do everything with mere seconds to spare. I'm also the reason why a villain will always utter "That's impossible" or "I am invincible" or "Foolish mortal" right before they die – I find most audiences love to heart those lines. Don't worry though, those changes are only cosmetic. Feel free to ask me about the history that used to be but now never was. The secret histories are only secret because they never happened anymore, not because they're secret.


	4. Remilia Scarlet

Remilia Scarlet's notes on fate

Fate is a funny thing. If you know your fate, it is no longer fate and can be avoided. I, the master of fate, know this more than anyone.

Most the denizens of Gensokyo assume that I stay away from fate manipulation, that even I know better than to trifle with the subject. They assume that fate manipulation is difficult, and not something that can be controlled on a whim. Little do they know that I am constantly manipulating fates, sometimes to protect friends and other times for mere amusement.

Everyone in the world is bound together by strings of fate that they can't see. I take those strings and tie them together. The manipulated cannot see the knot because they can't see the string. However, if I tell them that the know is there, my victims can try to untie the knot and may even break the string doing so.

To manipulate a fate, I need to know all the important parties involved, and the more knowledge I have about the fate the more likely it is that the new fate will happen. And a fate must involve two or more people(youkai, oni, , hungry ghosts, cirnos); only the living have fates and thus trying to tie a string from Sakuya to a string from a rock is impossible since the rock has no string to tie. So while I could not fate Sakuya's success in bringing back spring back during the unending winter incident, nor could I fate Sakuya's victory against Yuyuko until I was aware of Yuyuko, I can fate that Sakuya defeat Yuyuko once I learned of the ghost. Likewise, when I fated that my sister Flandre remain locked away in our mansion for 500 years, I couldn't foresee Marisa ending the fate after only 495 since there was no Marisa when the fate was made. Although Marisa would never have come had I not started an incident, so I myself probably terminated the fate early by accident.

Flandre's fate was a special case to say the least. It should not have worked. My own involvement should have stopped the fate much earlier. And the other servants should have broken it too once I told them about my abilities and Flandre's fate. I consider it a success, and I am still trying to figure out how it worked.

Flan used to be much more unsociable than she is now, dangerously so, and it would often cost us dinner. So I declared "Remilia keeps Flandre hidden from the world for 500 years" and I added my servants to a list of people Flandre would meet. Marisa was most certainly not on that list. Fortunately, Flan's has much more control of herself now, but she is also much, much stronger. She discovered a spell that lets her break things in four places at once, managed to use her wings as a magical amplifier, and can "kyuu" things that shouldn't be breakable, like fire and air.

Flandre sees the materials of the world and has complete control over them. Her impact is on the body. My power works on the spirit of the world, I have control over people. I have to account for every person I can when making a fate because each person has their own distinct fate which, unless I manipulate it, will interfere with the fates I have created. And I can never tell anyone that I'm manipulating their fates, because a fate once known can be avoided. The fact that I can't tell anyone about an ongoing fate may be the reason people assume that I don't like using fate manipulation as much as I do. Naturally, I also cannot try to manipulate someone into doing the impossible, but this tends to be a non-issue in Gensokyo.

For my own sake, I keep a record of every fate I make. This helps me avoid conflicts and keeps me aware of upcoming fates to attend to. It is a large library I would like to share one day, provided I could avoid messing up my current fates. I cannot write my own fate, because the fact that I knew the fate would make it no longer fate. Thus, in every endeavor I am the most likely person to ruin the fates that I make. However, by sending Sakuya I can make sure that everything goes as planned by removing myself from the equation. Provided I know everyone Sakuya could meet and I stay away, it is impossible for Sakuya to ever fail to resolve an incident.

It is also impossible for Meiling to ever fail to find my dinner. I do half the work for her, getting lost victims to walk right in front of her post. And I make sure Reimu is always too busy with company to look into it, if you know what I mean. Although I don't know what I mean myself, since I was never particularly specific. "Reimu will be visited by Marisa, and they will remain together all night." I find it's funnier when the fate looks worse than it is.

I used my power to gain every servant at my household. If I ever tell them that, they could fight the fate. And I'm always present, which makes the fate especially likely to come undone. So I usually tell each servant everything about my powers within a few months. China is still a good gate guard, and Sakuya is forever the perfect maid. All the other applicants were a bit hesitant, but they sure tasted good.


	5. Utsuho Reiuji

Utsuho Reiuji

I am not an idiot.

I would prefer to not be called an idiot, thought of as an idiot, assumed to be an idiot, or be treated like an idiot by association.

The control rod on my right arm functions because I'm able to do molecular physics of problems of k^n complexity in an instant. Mind you, a lot of that was from eating a sun god. And I'm not sure why I thought that was a good idea at the time. But please stop calling the girl who can handle quantum mechanics sufficiently to create stable miniature suns an idiot. Especially when she can throw those suns at you.

I am an idealist.

To a hell raven, Hell is paradise. What most people think of Heaven, hell ravens think of Hell. So I wanted to bring my paradise to the surface. Back then I couldn't understand what was wrong with that. Everyone loves Hell. It's nice and toasty, there's parties all the time, and the sun shines 24 hours a day. I thought I was just making more of a good thing. But then a shrine maiden and a witch told me creating Hell on Earth was a bad thing, and beat me up. I still don't quite get it, but I don't really understand the biology of people that live above ground; it's mostly just hell ravens down here, with the Oni being the closest race.

I was given the power of nuclear fusion to make the outside world a better place, or so I was told. I don't think I should do it by making the outside world Hell. At least not until I get some more practice in. I'll need some more time to get used to my new powers before I can take on the shrine maiden and the witch again. Maybe I should turn the moon into a sun. Everyone likes the sun, and in Gensokyo the night's pretty scary. Youkai do most their killing at night. Plants can't grow at night. And making the moon a sun would make the world warmer, which is always a good thing.

I've seen a few of the books from the outside world on the moon, and they all say the moon doesn't have anything on it. I'm a little surprised because I was always told about the moon rabbits, but the books are the same ones I use for research on how to use nuclear fusion, so they have to be right. That's a pity too, because the moon will be much, much warmer when I'm done with it. Earth bunnies may not be able to handle Hell, but I'm sure that anything capable of living on the moon could take a little heat. I believe that I first need to calculate a good launch angle to first send me into orbit, command a steady stream of output into the control rod, and with that I should be able to reach the moon within 20 hours if I have a good launch window. I'll rest in earth's orbit, and between 1 and 2 earths orbits I'll launch into the moon's orbit. I can prepare a descent from there. Pretty soon I'll be able to make the sun shine all night long, or at least on the nights that the moon rises.

With the power of nuclear fusion, I will make the world a better place. Surface dwellers need the sun, so I will give them more. The moon will shine brighter than the sun, night will become day and the earth will bask in the warmth of the sun like it never has before. And little by little, the world will become a paradise.


	6. Medicine Melacholy

Medicine Melancholy

Lily of the Valley is a sweet smelling flower popular in gardens. Also known as suzuran, the plant contains deadly quantities of poison. I fill my garden with nothing but these flowers. Their poison was the first thing I ever tried to manipulate. I expanded into manipulating all types of poisons from suzuran.

A poison is a substance that, given enough of it, keeps the bodies of humans and youkai from working right. Snake venom is poisonous. So is morphine and even cold medicine. Chocolate is toxic to dogs, but not to people. Some people find nuts dangerous as well, which makes it poisonous to them. To me, everything is a poison if you use enough of it.

I don't have enough of some things. When I fight, I have to use potent toxins since I don't have very much to work with. Currently I can only manipulate and develop a little bit of any chemical at any time, and I borrow heavily from my flowers. I can't make solid objects efficiently for battle yet. And I can only manipulate liquids and gases well; solids are too heavy. I can't be all that flashy with my skills, but when I really want to kill I cover the field in as much and as many poisons as possible, because that is the best way for me to win.

Maintenance was tough. Dolls don't feel pain, but they do break. And my wood joints weren't made to absorb the suzuran poison. It got easier when I started using chemical manipulation to forge parts. A spare leg can take a week to make, and my most my spares aren't made out of wood, but a substance from the outside world, called plastic. I prefer to use wooden limbs when I can; though they take a month to perfect and they aren't as durable, they can absorb the poison from my flowers much better than plastic.

My hobbies include tending to my garden, looking after and repairing forsaken dolls, and genocide. One day I want to kill all humans. Yuuka likes the idea too, and we often talk about all the people she has slain. Yuuka sees no difference between a sunflower and a person; she kills anyone who harms her flowers. She's my best friend.

Do you want to be my friend too? Anyone who hates humanity is a friend of mine. We can plan the destruction of the human race together. It'll be fun. We can get revenge for all the dolls humans enslaved. We can watch them suffer as my toxins take their last breath, and laugh at their pain. It's OK if you're human. I can just kill you, and then we can be friends forever.

…Please?


	7. Yukari Yakumo

Yukari Yakumo: Notes on Boundaries

I can manipulate any boundary that exists.

Existence exists because there are boundaries between all objects. Without borders, there cannot be a "this" and a "that", a "me" and a "you", an "all" and a "one". Everything would just be singular. I can take the "me" and the "you", and turn it into a single entity, or take myself and turn me into multiple entities. Not that it would be a good idea. Boundary manipulation takes eons to learn, and I would never go around poking at the boundaries that exist in my own mind – no doctor performs surgery on themselves if they can avoid it.

I have this space, my domain of sorts. It's a location where the boundary between "myself" and "everything" does not exist. From here, I use my eyes to look through gaps and locate where I wish to place gaps, and I use my hands to tie the gaps. I do not mean the eyes on my face or the hands on my body. These eyes and hands are a part of the everything that is me within my void. A big downside is that there are places I simply can't form a portal to. For example, a portal within the sun is impossible because I would have to touch the portal to tie the knot, and half of it would be inside the sun. It's a little too hot for me.

However, I can make portals beneath large objects and drop them, within armories, or even into space if I'm careful around the gap. And provided it isn't impossible at the time I made the portal, I can make a portal which lava will flow through later, as long as I don't have to touch the portal while lava is flowing through it.

My portals are double-sided holes in reality that can be tied singularly to form a route into my domain, or double tied to form a direct route to a second location. By double sided, I mean that hurling an object through the front of portal A causes it to exit the back of portal B. Hurling the object through the back of portal A sends it through the front of portal B. It's a convenient method of removing special paradox, but it's a little hard to explain.

Now, a boundary separates two things. The boundary between two countries is a non-boundary; I can't manipulate it because while I can alter a map, shift the boundaries within the synapses of the brain of an individual, or shift a landmark at the location of the border, to actually shift the boundary would require that I alter the minds of millions of people and maps, each one individually. Likewise, the boundary between freezing and boiling doesn't really exist; after all, a cup of boiling water and the same cup of water, but freezing is still the same water, so there is no boundary between the two states other than a conceptual boundary. However, the boundary between an ice cube and the water it is in has a very easy to manipulate boundary; in fact, the boundary disappears on its own when the ice melts (or when the rest of the water freezes).

Obeying the laws of entropy is always easier than ignoring them when it comes to boundary manipulation. I mentioned above that the boundary between an ice cube and water can be manipulated by freezing the rest of the water or melting the ice cube. The latter is a much easier task, because it would happen on its own, while the former requires much more effort. The border between two objects with clearly defined borders, like a car and a stop sign, is much simpler to manipulate than the border between a solid and a gas, like ground beef and air.

To manipulate these boundaries with any precision takes time and effort. While manipulation the boundary between a robot and a shark to create a shark cyborg sounds likes a really cool idea, the amount of effort that goes into making sure that the shark doesn't die when I manipulate it's boundary and that the robot still works makes it incredibly difficult, and impossible to do at combat speeds. Done quickly results in a dead shark with a short-circuited robot sticking out the back. Portals, or manipulation of the boundary between locations, are almost always more convenient than manipulating the boundaries between two objects for combat purposes. Manipulating the boundary between two things is only convenient when one of the things is your opponent, because it always ends in a bloody mess.

That concludes my summary of boundary manipulation. Any questions?


	8. Yuuka Kazami and Rin Kaenbyou

It was a peaceful, sunny day in the sunflower field. Or it would be, if I were not being disturbed by cat hell spawn. "Well, well," I say, gritting my teeth. "Aren't you a brave kitty. What's your name?"

"Rin Kaenbyou, ma'am. And I take it you're Miss Yuuka Kazami, master of flowers and genocide?"

"One and the same," I reply, politely but firmly. "It's so rare for fertilizer to come willingly, you know, what makes you so foolish today?"

"Well, I had some time off, and I'm a huge fan of your work, you see, will you sign my remains?" the cat asks, pulling a skull and a pen out of her wheelbarrow.

"I suppose I can give a last request," I say, signing the thing's forehead and handing it back to the cat.

"EEEEEEE, thank you thank you thank you," Rin says, squealing as I point my umbrella at her.

"Goodbye," I say, aiming my umbrella slightly upwards so as to miss the sunflowers. With a flash of light, I obliterate all in the path of my umbrella, and peace returns to the field.

"That. Is. So. Cool!" the cat squeals.

Looks like I was mistaken. I turn around to face the girl. Fast and annoying. She will be troublesome.

The girl goes on, "Is that how you wipe cities off the map?"

"No, it's too small for that, at best I'd take out a small village. Now cities, on the other hand," I say, as every sunflower in my field turns to the cat. "Well, I am a gardener, and cities are weeds."

Every sunflower in my field lunges out of the ground towards the cat, who weaves around the rapidly ascending stalks as she throws herself to the sky. "You really are as amazing as they say, I can't get near you at all like this!"

Unfortunately, I can't seem to touch the girl either. This is why I hate cats, they have no problem cheating death eight times in a row.

"If you'd be so kind as to stop moving, I'd love to show your how my roses get their lovely red hue," I say.

"Ooooo, you use blood too. It's got a great hue," the cat yells, rapidly retreating from my flowers, "Back home we only use it on the walls."

I snap, and my flowers return back to earth, losing the massive size they gained to chase the cat.

"Alright girl," I smirk, "You've got my attention. Where is this home of yours?"

"It's the Palace of the Earth Spirits."

"And who are you," I continue.

"Ah, well, I'm Rin Kaenbyou," the girl starts before I cut her off.

"Yes, that's your name, but who are you?"

"Well, I suppose I'm the girl responsible for feeding bodies to the fires of hell. Somebody's got to keep the furnace fueled."

"Ah," I say, "Well, you may be the big-shot in hell, but up here, let's just say you do not want to cross me."

"Cross you?" Rin says. "No, no, no, you've got me all wrong. I happy just meeting you!"

"That is a surprise," I say, "But I'm afraid I'm only good at making bodies, not disposing of them."

"True, but you are the best at making bodies!" Orin says. "Your record back in 1944 has never been beaten. You're a living legend!"

"And yet you still come to me," I say.

"Of course." Rin says. "You're the last big name left."

"I am?" I say, a little shocked.

"The big killers are all dead. The world isn't as twisted as it used to be. Sure, their spirits live on, and I love talking to those guys. Henry and Genghis can be a real riot sometimes," the cat explains. "But you, you have one thing they lack - You're still alive. You're still raking up bodies. And you're still the best at it."

I look at the girl. I say, "Alright, I'll amuse you. What do you want to know?"

"Well, the big stuff," Rin says, clutching her signed skull. "How many. Your methods. And why."

"Well, the number depends on who you include," I smirk. "Sure, I killed millions of humans, but what about livestock foolish enough to eat my flowers? Deer who trample them, wolves who dig them up, there are billions of creatures I have decided needed my help to cease acting inappropriately, usually by ceasing their functions completely."

"Ah," Rin says, pulling out a notebook from her wheelbarrow as she begins to take notes. "And what about the youkai?"

"Youkai foolishly think they count more than humans, and both think I care about them more than worms. I couldn't begin to distinguish them from that tally, but then again, why would you? And I suppose you think you're somehow above my judgment as well?"

"Oh no," Rin says, "I'm just good at running. So now, how do you do it?"

Glancing at the roots at the girl's feet, I admit this girl would make an interesting flower. "Well, I suppose that depends on my mood. I mean, some days you want to do a little gardening, some days you want to blast the weeds away, and some days, you want to rip the heads off the fertilizer. Of course, it's even easier if you're subtle; I've poisoned my share of water supplies. And then there are days when I just let civilization grow. Cultivate. Spread. What fun is gardening without letting it become a challenge?"

"Ooooo, I think I'm starting to get you," Rin says. "And the why is starting to look obvious. Wait, lemme guess, you love your garden more than anything, and kill anyone who gets in the way of it?"

"Close girl. The flowers are my friends. Fauna are their butcher. And I am their caretaker," I say, as the roots slowly work their way around the ignorant girl's legs. I walk up to the girl, pointing my umbrella at her throat. "And since the weed stands before me, let me pluck you now."

A flash explodes from the tip of my umbrella. I look down, seeing the girl lying under me, the roots cut. I point my left index finger at her, and another flash explodes, this time from my free hand.

"Oooo boy, that must be a dual spark!" Rin says from behind me again. "Whelp, gotta get back to work sis! So, I'll be seeing ya?"

I smirk, clapping twice. "You, I think I'll cultivate you."


End file.
